I am wanting to write a visual basic front end to my sql server 2000 database. I have downloaded visual basic express 2005 and it only seems to want to connect to an sql server express database.
Is it possible to connect visual basic express to sql server 2000 and if not whats the best way to go about this

Connecting to sql server
Zoner21
Yes in a way... but remeber that only the Wizards and automatic processes for development will not connect to remote sources. You can connect to other databases by coding the solution manually. One method that I have talked about a bit in the forums is to connect your code to bindable objects then the wizards can connect to the binable objects, the Personal Web Site Starter Kit has a good example of this that can be ported to a windows forms solution.
SQ
One thing you will have to remember is that the Express edition database wizards will only connect to the local machine and SQL Express, to connect to remote sources you will need to code the data layare yourself. One way is to write the data layer to produce objects that can be bound to, then the wizards to pick them up.
deepak2000
Tadeu
You should be able to access the database through code. I am running vs 2005 not the vb express so I can not test this. Try droping a datagridview on the form. Add this code to the forms load event
<code>
Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load
Dim da As SqlDataAdapter
Dim conn As SqlConnection
Dim ds As New DataSet
Dim strConn As String
strConn = String.Format("Server = {0};", Environment.MachineName)
strConn &= "Database = NorthWind; Integrated Security = SSPI;"
conn = New SqlConnection(strConn)
da = New SqlDataAdapter("Select * from Products", conn)
da.Fill(ds, "Products")
DataGridView1.DataSource = ds.Tables("Products")
End Sub
</code>
B Turner
sadietz
That's a pretty good resource. Thanks for posting.
wargammer2005
My preferred source for connection strings:
http://www.carlprothman.net/Default.aspx tabid=81
Just about every possible database you can think of... with good code examples too.
Oh... and it covers ADO.Net and ADO Classic connection strings too. :)
DeepakBakshani
The sqlConnection object only seems to connect to the SQLServer2005. I've used the OleDBConnection to connect to SQL Server 2000:
Dim conn as System.Data.OleDb.OleDbConnection
make sure you specify the provider (provider=sqloledb) for SQL Server.
Hope that helps.
SJW